The invention relates to a ballast hopper door and blade control apparatus and method for controlling a plurality of hopper discharge doors and a pair of ballast distributing blades on a railroad ballast car.
Railroad ballast has traditionally been discharged and/or spread by specially designed hopper cars called "ballast cars". In such cars, the ballast is discharged through hopper doors positioned beneath the hopper. In the past, when such doors were positioned directly beneath the car, ballast discharged therefrom was spread by hand, a labor intensive task, or by an additional specially equipped railroad car which followed the ballast hopper car.
These problems were addressed in U.S. Pat. No. 3,654,872 ('872 patent) in which a ballast car has four hoppers, each of which is provided with a bottom-mounted discharge opening with a discharge control member inserted therein. The discharge openings are centered over a rail and each discharge control member is a pivotable structure with a pair of side walls extending at an angle outward from an arcuate top surface. A bottom wall connects the side walls and a pair of end walls extend past the side walls to form channels on either side of the discharge control member. The discharge control member is attached at a pivot point positioned below the discharge opening. The arcuate top surface covers the discharge opening when the discharge control member is pivoted to a center position. When the discharge control member is pivoted to one side or the other, the discharge opening is partially opened and ballast is released through the channel formed by one of the angled side walls and the end walls and is thus directed to an associated side of the railroad rail. By selectively pivoting the discharge control member, a proper mount of ballast is directed to a desired position which minimizes or eliminates subsequent spreading requirements. On ballast cars containing pairs of side-by-side hoppers, ballast can be selectively distributed inside or outside of each rail to further minimize spreading requirements.
Even with the use of discharge control members for directing ballast to one side or the other of respective rails, nevertheless, after the ballast is dropped, some spreading and redistributing is required.
In U.S. Pat. No. 5,423,268, ("the '268 patent") issued to the present inventor on Jun. 13, 1995, which patent is hereby incorporated by reference, a ballast distributing railcar is illustrated with a pair of ballast distributing blades arrayed, one proximate the wheels on each respective end of the railcar. A pair of ballast carrying hoppers each include a pair of center discharge hopper doors covering respective discharge openings from the hoppers. The blades are associated with hydraulic systems which can selectively raise and lower them such that one of the blades is correctly oriented for distributing ballast regardless of the direction of travel of the railcar. The center discharge doors of the '268 patent, however, allow the dropping of ballast only between the rails. Thus, the ballast distributing blades must move ballast from between the rails to the outside of the rails in a somewhat inefficient operation. Furthermore, the placement of the ballast distributing blades near the wheels, although generally satisfactory, has the effect of distancing the operative blade from one of the sets of hopper discharge doors. This blade placement also prevents the simultaneous use of one hopper or hopper pair in a car for large scale depositing of ballast while the other hopper or hopper pair is used for "sprinkle dumping" of relatively small amounts of ballast to fill in holes and irregularities in the ballast bed. Finally, in the '268 patent, power to the hydraulic systems for operating hopper doors and blades was provided from an electrical generator or storage battery. In some cases, it would be preferable to use existing sources of compressed air, such as air compressors integrally provided on locomotives, to drive the hydraulic systems. Solar electrical cells are another alternative energy source.
It is clear that a need exists for an improved ballast distributing railcar with ballast distributing blades and a remote control apparatus and method therefor. The apparatus and method should provide alternative blade and hopper placement strategies as well as alternative power sources for operating the blades, hopper doors, hopper chutes and remote control systems. Simultaneous large scale ballast drops and sprinkle dumping should also be possible in at least some railcar embodiments.